


Fortuna Major

by Oxers



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, Gen, Hogwarts Founders Era
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-11-02
Updated: 2013-11-09
Packaged: 2017-12-31 07:42:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 14,093
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1029075
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Oxers/pseuds/Oxers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The world is a cold, dangerous place, and none are to be trusted. None but your equals. Ongoing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Salazar awoke with muscles stiff from cold.

It was always a bit of a struggle rousing himself in the morning. The fire had long since burned down in the pit, and he curled a little more tightly under the boar pelt he had wrapped himself in the night before. The wet season had not yet truly taken hold, but it wouldn't be long before he found himself waking to a gossamer-fine layer of frost encroaching from beneath the door each day. He dreaded it. 

Of course, their hut was no where near as cold as it could have been. There was a rustling somewhere to his right; the scuff of bare feet on packed dirt, the soft snap of a bundle of dried herbs being broken into handfuls. A word, a hiss, and the air in their little dwelling seemed to surrender the worst of its wintry edge far too quickly for a fire just lit. Salazar willed himself to doze just a bit longer against the backdrop of his mother's morning routine. She hummed as she worked, motions practiced and sure even in the dimness. 

When at last he did talk himself into shifting, stretching, and opening his eyes, the first thing he met was the snake coiled beside him. 

The pitiful thing had slithered into their hut and onto the straw mat he slept on, and it watched him now, still and silent. A smile pulled at Salazar's lips. It wasn't the first time he had woken to an unexpected bedfellow. Whether for warmth or the fact that he wouldn't dash them against the nearest hard object, Salazar wasn't sure, but the water snakes of the ditches and canals surrounding their little dwelling took any opportunity they could to sneak into the tiny hut on the driest patch of land. Pushing himself upright and shaking stringy black hair from his eyes, the boy extended a hand, into which the snake obediently curled.

“Good morning, sweet,” murmured his mother. “Another visitor?”

“Mmhm.” Stumbling clumsily to his feet, the boy shuffled across the length of their home, pried the rudimentary door open with his spare hand and allowed the snake to lower itself to the ground and slither off into the nearby reeds. “Just one this time.”

“Thank the Lord for that. We'll be overrun soon.”

“At least we don't have to worry about mice in the oats.” 

His mother shot him a smile he could barely make out in the semi-dark. The only source of illumination in the watery, pre-dawn gloom was the very small fire crackling to life beneath a pile of peat and althaea, and it did little to clarify her features. Not that he needed it. His mother was a drawn, tired woman, but her eyes remained warm, and she never looked on her son with anything less than adoration. Her thick, dark hair was once reminiscent of his but was now shot through with gray, and she kept it bound back with a loop of leather she had worn as long as he could remember. He thought her lovely. She motioned for him to help her, and so Salazar retrieved for her the large, earthenware cauldron their home seemed to revolve around. She hung it carefully on the beam over their fire pit and busied herself with readying their breakfast. 

As she worked, Salazar stuffed his feet into a rough pair of leather shoes resting by his mat and slipped outside to run through his chores. Crisp morning air greeted him, sharp and steadying, and he squinted in the thin morning light as his eyes struggled to adjust. 

The fens were not beautiful. A long, flat, featureless marsh stretched before him in all directions, marred by ditches and channels, pools of stagnant water, patches of bulrush and, occasionally,what was clearly a half-hearted attempt at a road, abandoned long before completion. Building anything stable, anything of a steady foundation was a near impossibility in this sodden hell hole. Nothing lasted. Nothing could be trusted. The water took everything. It stole all you planted and all you carried, stripped you of anything it desired and left only unbleached bones behind. Fenmen existed at its mercy, laying eel traps and digging trenches, building sluices and waging war, as if there was anything to be done. As if they stood a chance. 

They didn't. Salazar knew this to be true.

Salazar pulled his tunic closer to himself against the chill. A thick fog hung low in the air, barely discernible against slate-gray sky. The overall effect was a strange one, rendering the world an uncertain dreamscape pocked with shadow and drained of color. Somewhere far in the distance stood other small huts much like his, housing families much larger than his own, but he and his mother might well have been the last people on Earth for as far into the fog as Salazar could see. The boy had no desire to linger. Picking his way carefully through the mist along a path he knew by heart, he reached their tiny, makeshift dock and pulled hard on the rope dangling off the edge. A sturdy, latticed trap of willow emerged from the canal, soaked and full of frantic motion. In spite of himself, Salazar smiled. It had been a while since they'd caught a few good sized eels. They'd eat well tonight.

It was a cold, wet job, extracting the eels and throwing them into a burlap sack he kept on the dock for just such occasions. By the end of it Salazar was nearly as damp as his catch was. Kicking the trap back into the canal where it hit with a dull splash, he hefted the sack over his shoulder and hurried to the wood pile around the far side of their tiny home, cursing softly when his shoe sank into an unexpectedly soft patch of mud. He wrenched himself free, balanced three fat logs in the crook of one long, skinny arm and tottered back inside as quickly as he could. 

His mother's magic had done its job; it was properly warm now. Porridge was starting to simmer in their pot, smelling better than something so bland had any right to, and his mother was sweeping widdershins around the room, prepping for the day's work. She glanced up as he tumbled in, pointing for her son to leave his mud-caked shoes by the door. Salazar didn't understand what difference it could have possibly made, considering everything they had seemed to end up coated in a thick film of mud, but he obeyed regardless. 

“We finally got a decent catch,” he told her. “Three or four big ones.”

She smiled, eyes focused on the task at hand. “That's wonderful. Stew for supper, then?”

Salazar nodded. “Any bread left?”

“Some. I think we might come across some butter today, too. Merek's cow is ailing, I've heard. I expect we may see him soon.”

The thought cheered Salazar. They'd been out of butter for months. They generally didn't dare make the several day journey to market, even if they'd had a wagon or a horse to pull it. Their reputation didn't allow for such risks. Aside from what eels they could trap and what stringy, pungeant onions they could grow in the waterlogged garden patch outside, Salazar and his mother were largely dependent on whatever desperate customers made the trek to their little thatched hut for a visit to the apothecary. 

The Fenmen called his mother a witch. They were right, of course, but no one had yet cared to prove it. As far as Salazar could tell, they remained safe from the villagers' superstition due to his mother's inherent worth to them; peddling remedies, poultices and potions from the confines of their home, she had saved children and livestock, crops and grandparents – she had pulled entire families back from the brink with great discretion and for only a modest fee. When the priest's empty words failed to soothe an infant's fever, the child's mother would quietly make her way to the easternmost corner of the dismal fiefdom they inhabited, a pound of butter or a block of hard cheese heavy in her sack for trade. No one complained while Salazar's mother was saving lives. 

“Come here, sweet,” she was saying, gesturing with delicate, tapered fingers for her son to join her. “Help me check last week's batch, won't you?”

Unquestioningly, Salazar complied. The far side of the room served as his mother's work space. Clay jars lined the walls on rudimentary shelving, and he began pulling a row of them down one by one, inspecting the contents and replacing them. It was a simple sleeping draught, nothing more. The preparation was very straightforward, but it required a fortnight under the waxing moon to settle and grow potent. The recipe was his mother's, passed down from her mother and her mother before her, but Salazar had improved upon it. He had improved on a fair number of her potions; despite a total lack of education on the topic, the boy had a knack for it. 

They had their routine neatly memorized. His mother moved fluidly about the space, fingers flying deftly as she prepared a new tonic. The same melody he had heard her singing all of his life lingered on her lips, louder in the tiny space than it otherwise might have been. Salazar nearly hummed along. He avoided her path, checking their stores, tweaking a swelling serum with a quick infusion of ganglerot powder, making quick work of a basket of black mushrooms that had been needing chopping. They were as organized as they could have been, given their conditions. When he turned to show her the quickly thickening texture of a poultice for burns, his mother smiled down at him, deepening the lines around her eyes. She pressed a kiss to the crown of his head. 

“How'd you get so good at this?” she wanted to know.

Salazar shrugged modestly, glowing with pride. 

It wasn't until he had also beheaded and gutted the eels, carefully separating their innards for future potions while throwing the flesh into a spare pot to start supper with, that the two of them sat down to breakfast. She ladled unseasoned porridge into a coarse wooden bowl for her son and he devoured its contents with gusto. It wasn't a pleasant meal, exactly, but Salazar was silently grateful that they'd had milk to make it with. It was always so much worse with water. 

As he was scraping the last of the flavorless paste from his bowl and contemplating another, he first caught the distant sounds of people approaching. His mother looked up, listened a moment, and stood, wiping her hands on the coarse apron around her waist. 

“That'll be Merek, I expect,” she said to her son, moving for the door. “A bit early in the day, but I suppose-”

She stopped mid-sentence. The sudden silence was pregnant and instantly tense, and his mother whipped around to face him, features drawn tight. She kneeled and gripped his face in both hands, urgency in every syllable.

“Listen to me, Salazar. I want you to stay inside, all right? Whatever happens, you don't come outside. Do you understand me?” 

Salazar didn't understand. He opened his mouth to say as much, but his mother shook her head, wisps of hair flying free of the knot at the base of her neck and framing her face with a sort of unkempt desperation.

“Don't argue. Don't ask questions. Stay inside, no matter what you hear. Promise me, Salazar.” 

His mouth opened and closed several times of its own volition. Eyes wide, a knot forming heavily in his chest, the boy could do nothing but nod. His mother embraced him quickly, kissing his forehead. “That's my good boy,” she whispered. The woman then turned, motioned for him to get back, and again opened the door. Salazar crouched in the furthest, darkest corner, heart beating in his ears. 

“G'morning, sirs,” he heard his mother call in a voice false with brightness. “It's rare I see company out this far. What brings you?”

There was a rumble of multiple voices, the stamping and whinnying of multiple horses. Above them rose one voice, rough and authoritative and cracking with disgust. 

“You will hold your tongue,” it boomed. “Marlene White, on the order of Lord Hadrian Winchell, Margrave of East Anglia, you have hereby been accused of the high crime of witchcraft.”

“Witchcraft?” Salazar's mother echoed. She struggled to disguise terror as confusion. “Sirs, I assure you there is no witchcraft here. The good Lord-” 

“She has no love for the Father and Son,” shrieked another voice. “Two floods in as many weeks! Six children lost! God has punished us for tolerating her demonic affairs. She must be dealt with!”

A cheer erupted. Salazar's mind raced. It didn't seem real. Why had they come at the crack of dawn? Were they afraid of what they might find in the dark of night?

“I have done nothing to harm this community,” Salazar's mother said, speaking now with greater conviction. “There is no witchcraft at my hearth. I heal your wounds and soothe your sick. I use what little knowledge of the medicinal arts I have to help whoever I can. You have no quarrel with me, sirs, nor any demons who dwell at my door. There are none.”

“It's not just you, Marlene,” spoke yet another voice, familiar and strangely apologetic. Merek. Merek and his ailing cow. How many times had he come to them for help? “It's the boy. He's unnatural.”

A moment of silence. Salazar could picture his mother trying to speak, dark eyes darting from one man to the next. 

“Where is he?” 

“Gone,” she replied in a strangled tone of voice. “I sent him on an errand yesterday morn. He should be back in a few days' time.”

“She's lying!”

“String her up!”

“The boy will come for our children!”

“He'll-” 

“Silence!” boomed the first voice. There was a pocket of stillness around which Salazar could just make out of the sounds of the fens, the rushing water and soft rustle of small creatures in the thrushes. He couldn't breathe. His head swam. Slithering silently up to him, having slipped through the open door, was the same snake he had found beside him that morning. It raised itself up to examine him, a primitive, reptilian curiosity in cold, black eyes. 

“Both you and your son will pay for your crimes against God and this village,” the voice announced. “You have been condemned to death.”

The mob cheered again. Salazar's blood boiled. A great and terrible storm of static and thunder raged in his head, burning in his skin, carrying him away. Beside him, the fire in the pit erupted, jumped six feet in the air and began licking the roof of their home. There was a clamor outside as people began moving and shouting, advancing on the only person Salazar had; his mother's shriek cut through the air, white-hot, agony made auditory, and his silent promise to stay inside simply evaporated. He scrambled to his feet even as the room began to fill with smoke, flames crawling along the walls, and burst out with a guttural cry. 

The mob was larger than he would have expected. At least fifteen, maybe twenty people had gathered, many of whom Salazar had known most of his life, clutching clubs and sticks and anything else that could have passed for a weapon. They were led by a haggard-looking man well into his forties, mounted on a pitch black charger and outfitted in armor of burnished iron. A knight of Lord Winchell's, here to do the Margrave's bidding while keeping the noble hands clean. He had Salazar's mother by the hair. A man Salazar had once helped with a chronic headache held a rough length of rope, ending in the unmistakable loop of a noose. 

Something deep and ancient awoke in Salazar; something terrible, smelling of blood and fury. The boy screamed and the house behind him was abruptly engulfed in flame. There was a moment of confusion, the knight locking eyes with Salazar and shouting something the young wizard couldn't hear. A handful of villagers moved towards him. His mother's eyes had gone wide with panic. She was also screaming, he realized. Some dim, distant part of him knew that. 

The first man to touch him dropped to the ground without warning, covered in large, angry-looking boils. He writhed about in the mud, face contorted in agony. The second to grab Salazar seized him by the forearm and found himself thrown towards the burning wreckage of the hut, hitting a wooden beam with a sickening crack. A third cracked the boy over the skull with a wooden cudgel. Stars exploded behind Salazar's eyes, bringing him to his knees. Someone grabbed him and pinned him down, deaf to Salazar's wordless, furious wail, until a snake attached itself firmly to the skin just below his assailant's eye. The man ripped away from Salazar, stumbling back, clutching at the snake and adding his own hellish shrieks to the din.

Salazar pushed himself up and briefly wondered why the ground seemed alive. It shimmered with activity, and in every direction, the men of the mob were shrieking, bucking, and scrambling to get away. Dozens of snakes pursued them. Hundreds. Every reptile in the marshlands had come to Salazar's aid, slithering after their quarry with a cold and agile fury.

His mother was clawing against her captors, motioning for Salazar to run. She deftly kneed the man with the rope in the groin and lunged toward her son, and for a moment, Salazar thought she would make it – grasp his hand, pull him out of harm's way, and disappear with him into the mist. 

The knight reared up on his war horse and caught the woman in mid-stride. Salazar couldn't even cry out. Round, gray eyes, clear and wise and etched with deepening crows feet – those eyes went wide with understanding, flickering with panic, dark with terror. Thin, pale lips mouthed the same word over and over. Run, they were saying. Run. The hunting knife was a silver streak in a dim world of smoke and fog, and it raked across his mother's throat with brutal efficiency. 

Somehow, Salazar couldn't quite make sense of what he was seeing. Blood had never seemed that red before. Her body went limp. The light left her eyes, replaced with an empty glassiness that seemed unnatural and wrong. She didn't respond when Salazar screamed for her. The knight dropped her and she crumpled, doll-like, in a patch of mud and gore, already forgotten. 

Salazar's voice seemingly stopped working. The words had left him. 

When the knight turned, his sights landing again on the small, filthy boy shivering in the early morning chill, his expression grew grim. He dismounted, clutching to his side the knife still slick with his mother's blood, and gestured for Salazar to come to him. 

Numbly, Salazar obeyed. 

His hand was heavy on Salazar's narrow shoulder. “Do you know why I've killed your mother, boy?”

Salazar couldn't respond. The man's eyes were a light, watery gray, a mockery of the unbending iron of his mother's gaze. There was no storm in this man's eyes. Not like his mother. Not like Salazar. 

“She was a witch. As are you. It is the only kind thing to do, child. Death is a preferable fate.” The knight's eyes fluttered shut and he kneeled to pray. “Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.”

Without knowing what he intended to do, heeding only the storm rumbling in his flesh, Salazar reached up and placed his palm against the cheek of the knight. The man who had murdered his mother looked at him in confusion, his prayer dying on his tongue; he seemed incapable of ripping away from the touch. A wordless noise rose up from the back of the knight's throat, a strange, halting, choking sort of groan. Those weak gray eyes rolled backwards into his head until only the whites were visible. Blood began to pool in his ears and drip from his nose. The body convulsed inside its armor. Salazar grit his teeth, his pulse pounding in his head, fire skipping through his skin. Something in him snapped, and just like that, the knight was gone.

Salazar stumbled back from the man – the corpse, now, which collapsed much as his mother had done. His eyes cast around, panicked and desperate; men still rolled in his clearing, nursing injuries or fighting serpents, though many were retreating. Those that still could. His hut was still burning, a plume of black smoke uncurling against the sky. It would draw others. He couldn't stay here. 

His mother still lay in the mud, lifeless and bent at an unnatural angle. Tears stung Salazar's eyes. He couldn't leave her, he couldn't. He scrambled to her side, slipping twice before he reached her. Empty eyes stared up at nothing. She was still warm, though the blood blooming down the front of her dress had already cooled. She had spun that dress herself. 

“Mum,” he squeaked, though he knew full well it would do no good. “Mum, come on.” 

He tugged fruitlessly at her shoulder, mind racing. He had heard tales of wizards appearing and disappearing at will, but that power was beyond him. He couldn't pick her up, couldn't even get purchase on her form, mud-slick as it was. A frustrated sob erupted from the boy. To his right, the war horse was prancing nervously, wanting to escape nearly as badly as Salazar did. His mother had said to run. 

With tear-blurred vision, Salazar bent and kissed his mother's hair, as she had so often kissed his. He stumbled to his feet and climbed gracelessly atop the horse, who was not expecting a new rider and reared. But Salazar clung tightly and did as he had seen farmers and soldiers do before, digging his heels into the animal. The horse's instincts finally won out, and they were running, galloping away. 

He looked back only once. Though he could still smell the iron bite of blood in the air, the clearing was disappearing into the haze of flame and mist. The fens were claiming it. Taking it for a sacrifice. 

Salazar buried his face in the neck of the horse as they rode. With every step, he wished for death.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Largely unbeta'd, I'm doing this project for NaNoWriMo - so while I will be churning material out pretty quickly, that doesn't necessarily mean it's all going to be completely cohesive. Bear with me! Also, I took some slight timeline liberties here. Nothing too big, but if you're as insane as I am, you might notice them. Just forewarning. Onward!

Salazar still did not care for waking early.

A rooster was crowing from the garden below and Salazar groaned quietly into the mattress. It wasn't quite dawn, but the tiny village outside his window was stirring to life regardless. Wagons rattled by, merchants chattered as they began to open their roadside stands and unless he was very much mistaken, a flock of geese was waddling along the lane and honking their ear-splitting honks with an entirely unnecessary persistence. He silently wished to see each and every one of them roasting on a spit.

He would have just as soon slammed his shutters tight, rolled over and dozed until noon, but Salazar had places to be. Reluctantly, he cast off his blanket and pushed himself upright, standing with a groan. His joints ached from a day of hard riding, and ached worse at the thought of another.

A basin of cold water sat on an end table beside his bed. Salazar seized a rag and immersed it, scrubbing the sleep from his eyes. Water dripped from two days of beard growth, and Salazar rubbed a hand across the bristles, wondering if he ought to shave. His room had not come equipped with a looking glass, and he found he didn't care so much as he might have had he woken at a less unreasonable hour. He shook the hair from his eyes. It needed a trim, but Salazar was not one to stay on top of such things.

Dropping heavily back onto his mattress, Salazar pulled a weathered pair of boots on over his leggings and laced them tightly. Everything the man owned was patched and shabby, obtained second hand and held together by magic alone. He didn't cut a very intimidating figure, but Salazar preferred it that way. It was that much easier to pass unnoticed.

He swung a heavy, woolen cloak around his shoulders, fastened it about his neck, hoisted his travel sack and swept quietly from his room. His feet made no noise on the floorboards outside. The inn he had stopped at was slower to wake than the village outside, laying largely still and silent as he padded down the staircase. A sleepy-eyed youth was sweeping out the dining area, preparing for the breakfast rush and looking as if he would also much rather have been in bed. He glanced up as Salazar entered.

“G'morning, sir. Would you like a-”

“I would not,” replied Salazar, brusquely but not unkindly. “I really must be on my way, but thank you all the same.”

“Oh.” The boy looked puzzled. “Some help with your horse, then?”

“I'll see to her myself, thanks.” On his way out, Salazar dropped a small bag of coins on the bar. Just enough to cover his stay and the child’s enthusiasm - the last thing he needed was rumblings of a tight-fisted stranger blowing through town now and again.The youth opened his mouth presumably to thank him, but Salazar didn't much care. The sooner he was on his way, the better. 

He had grown tall over the years. Tall and thin, though by no means frail. Salazar was a compact man, as if he were stingy and shrewd with even the mass of his own body. He dwarfed many of the villagers already milling about in the lane outside the inn, and he avoided them deftly, not quite jogging around the side of the ramshackle building towards the stables.

A stable boy had already been out, it seemed. The handful of horses lodged there were munching serenely out of generous feed sacks, tails flicking flies off of the portion of their flanks uncovered by rough burlap blanket. Salazar located Elsbeth, his dappled gray mare, at the far end of the line and dropped his bag outside her stall, whistling to let her know he was near. The horse looked over at him, oats stuck delicately to her nose, and let out a soft whinny in greeting. Salazar afforded her a rare smile.

“Having a lovely breakfast, hm?” He asked her in a murmur, more out of habit than anything else. “It had better be for what they charge. The king ought to worry less about thieves on the highway than thieves in his townships.” Elsbeth did not seem concerned with Salazar’s monetary woes, but that had never bothered him much. She was, after all, just a horse.

He worked quickly, brushing and grooming his steed, checking her hooves and her hindquarters for ticks. It appeared whatever stable hand the inn employed had already checked the horses over, but Salazar was not about to trust the care of his companion to a stranger. In a matter of moments, he had the horse saddled and ready to go, though she gave him a bit of a sour look as he removed the feed bag from under her snout.

“Oh, stop. It's coming with us. It's not as if I starve you.”

His horse whickered primly and Salazar rolled his eyes. He attached his travel sack to her tack, hauled himself neatly into the saddle and drove her forward with a soft click of his tongue. They merged with the now bustling village traffic, weaving in and out of children, merchants, foul-mouthed old women and farmers in search of either supplies or gossip. Several street vendors attempted to wave Salazar down, but he ignored them. However he felt about the prospect of a fresh bun or hot pie, it was more important to get on the road, and quickly.

Larnwick wasn't a large village. Salazar had stayed there more than once, given its convenient proximity to Finchley Hollow. The house of the Cornish nobles was a little less than a day's ride across the moors, and while there were no wizarding folk to speak of in Larnwick, people did seem to mind their business and avoid the asking of too many questions. Too many strangers filing in and out, Salazar supposed. Such an environment was bound to breed a less welcoming atmosphere.

Still, as the path widened and the traffic began to thin, he was glad to be rid of it. Towns had always made him nervous. The countryside stretched out before him, a familiar view composed of softly undulating meadows and hills of heather, peat and cotton-grass. Small patches of snow still lingered here and there, but spring had most definitely taken hold; the air blew fresh and sharp, rousing Salazar and filling him with a rare, bright boldness. His mare seemed to take heart as well, trotting down the well-worn path with much more vigor than she had greeted him with.

There were no other travelers that Salazar could see, and for this he was grateful. The route from Larnwick to Finchley was well known and frequently used, but on so fair a morning the man had anticipated most of the area's inhabitants would be preoccupied with their fields, using the first real break in the weather to plant as furiously as possible. His hope was for a swift and uneventful journey. Godric's note had seemed urgent when Salazar received it, his friend's overlarge horned owl having all but crashed into his camp, and he had rarely known the man to display anything remotely approaching urgency, even when the situation called for it. It unsettled him.

They made good time, even enjoying the weather and stopping here and there for a brief graze. His horse seemed particularly fond of the plump, purple thistles just beginning to peek out of the heather, not yet sharp enough to wound, and he could not find it in himself to deny her – not after he had cut her breakfast short.

About midday, Salazar veered off the road a ways to a small stream that ran clear and cold. He dismounted and filled his waterskin as his horse drank her fill, splitting an apple for the two of them to share. For a few moments, he permitted himself the luxury of lying back in the heather and letting his eyes flutter shut, memorizing the feeling of timid spring sunlight warming his skin. There were too few sunny days, he felt. Too few by far.

The path grew rockier and less forgiving the further out they rode. A low stone wall marked what had once been a settlement of some kind, Salazar supposed, long abandoned and left to decay. Tiny yellow flowers had crept up between the cracks along the wall, blooming as if completely unconcerned with the den of rock around them. The path would be thick with them by midsummer. Salazar urged Elsbeth onwards at a canter.

The sun was hanging low in the sky by the time the Hollow’s narrow towers came into view.

Finchley Hollow itself was a massive thing, heavily structured, one of the largest castles in the wild southland. It loomed over the moors with a stately reassurance, as confident as an inanimate edifice could claim to be. Far from the prying eyes of the King and his court, it was a court in miniature, surrounded by a ring of thatched huts and wooden homes, pig pens and horse stalls and a milling, chattering populace, largely ignorant of the magical happenings of their liege lord and his family. Perhaps three hundred souls dwelled in and around the castle, another few hundred scattered across the moorland on farming plots owned by the Finchley line. Salazar had no taste for nobility and certainly not the treatment they inflicted on the serfs over whom they ruled, but he had known Godric for years, and he was better than most. More reasonable and more compassionate, by any measure. It was hard to say if Salazar trusted the man, but it was perhaps as close to trust as he could come.

It always made Salazar nervous to ride straight into the hamlet. He attempted to look as if he belonged, to exude an air of rightness that would prevent any of the village's inhabitants from asking any questions or wondering why this thin, shabby man seemed so out of place with the usual visitors to the Lord Finchley's home. It always worked, of course, though whether that had more to do with Salazar's pantomime of normalcy or their own good sense not to interfere with the nobility's affairs, Salazar could never be sure. Regardless, chin up, spine straight, eyes locked on the path leading directly to the manor's small keep, he rode clear on through as he had every time before. No one said a word.

Two guards positioned at the base of the keep stiffened as he approached. Muggles both, Salazar was fairly certain, and apparently eager to weed out the riffraff.

“Hold up then. What business have you here?” asked one, older and more suspicious than his partner.

“A summons from Lord Finchley,” Salazar replied in a snippier tone than he had intended. “Let me pass. The matter is an urgent one.”

The guard peered at him around the noseguard of a battered leather helm, standard issue in Finchley’s personal guard, and seemed cross-eyed as a result. He was stooped with age and seemed to struggle to stand beneath the weight of his chainmail. It occurred to Salazar that this man’s posting might have been one of pity, or of thanks for a life of servitude to the Finchley line. It seemed the sort of thing Godric might do. “You one of them northern folks that’s been flooding in all day? Don’t look the sort. What's your name, if I might ask?” 

Irritation rippled through Salazar. He drew himself up a little taller, suddenly conscious of how he must look to those tired muggle eyes. 

“Listen here, you ignorant little whelp, I-”

“Salazar of Fen!” boomed a deep, unmistakable voice. Salazar and both the guards looked up in moderate alarm, and out of the keep at an eager clip strode an absolute bear of a man. Barrel-chested and broad-shouldered, he seemed a tower of muscle and sinew that had somehow gained sentience, the kind of man one did not test. He was not so tall as Salazar, but somehow seemed it whenever he spoke. As Salazar had come to expect of his friend, he was dressed well but practically, and a thick crop of flaming red hair drew any attention away from the simple cut of his tunic regardless. He wore a full beard of the same curious shade, giving one the impression of a man that had just walked out of a blacksmith's forge, still glowing fire-bright and dangerous as hell. A heavy, jewel-laden sword swung at his hip. Salazar had never seen him without it.

He dismounted before Godric could reach him, not quite smiling but wearing an expression of relief all the same. The huge man clapped Salazar on the shoulder and embraced him like a brother, chuckling deeply.

“It's been too long, my friend,” said Godric, and Salazar nodded.

“Too long by half. It's good to see you, Godric.”

“And you.” Godric held Salazar back and inspected him, bushy eyebrows raising of their own accord. “Good God, man. You're skin and bones. Is food too much of a luxury, then?”

Salazar snorted appreciatively. A meeting with Godric was never complete without commentary on the state of his physique. The burly man guided him directly past the guards and into the keep, horse in tow, which Salazar savored. Maybe he didn’t look the sort, but he’d wager the tired old guard would remember Salazar’s face the next time he begged entrance.

“How have you been, then? I'm glad my letter found you,” Godric was saying as they made their way to the stables, passing scurrying servants and fat, red chickens. “I was concerned you might be abroad or out of contact.”

“You've a very smart owl,” Salazar said, dropping his voice to ensure none passing by would overhear the conversation. “I was on my way to Shellbrook when she caught up with me.”

“Were you now? I wasn't aware there was anything of interest in Shellbrook.”

“There's not. There is a monastery with a considerable library outside the hamlet, however.”

“Ah.” Godric's eyes, a lively green ringed with sparks of gold, like the threat of distant lightning, gleamed with amusement. He was several years older than Salazar, but appeared several years younger. Salazar suspected it had a great deal to do with the man's sense of levity. “Still posing as a man of the cloth, are you?”

“When necessary. The knowledge we gain far outweighs my discomfort.”

Godric grinned as they stabled Elsbeth, watching Salazar break down his mare's tack and give her a rapid but thorough rub down. “You are going to get along magnificently with Rowena.”

Salazar's head snapped up, eyes narrowed. “Rowena. The Sorceress of Ravenclaw?” His words were little more than a whisper, though he could see no one else near the stall they had selected. “Is she the reason you called me here?”

“Technically, she called you. And about a dozen others. She came to me a week ago with business of a 'vital nature,' told me in no unspecific terms I'd be gathering every prominent witch and wizard I knew. You've never met her, but trust me, this is not a woman easily refused. I have stable hands that could do that for you, you know.”

Salazar frowned as he checked Elsbeth's hooves for stones, ignoring the comment altogether. “And did she tell you to what this business pertained?”

“She did.”

“And?”

“There was another burning.”

Salazar spun around, horror stretching his features thin. Godric waved the expression off. “Calm down. It was just Wendolin again. She's fine.”

Salazar's jaw clenched tightly in aggravation as he went back to what he was doing. He would never understand this behavior. He could accept that some of the wizarding community didn't understand the threat the outside world represented, yes. Some were more privileged than others. But these pointless risks, playing with the magicless as if the very act did not put hundreds, perhaps thousands of others in danger – he didn't understand it, and it infuriated him.

“We're going to have to start Obliviating entire villages at this rate,” Godric was saying. “And it's not just her, of course. A wizard in Brighton was seen turning a tax collector into a salamander a fortnight ago. Not that I disagree on moral terms, mind you, but it still presents a bit of a problem.”

“The fact that he was seen or the fact that an innocent man was turned into a salamander?” Salazar asked dryly. Godric looked taken aback.

“Innocent? You've clearly never met a tax collector. Come on, then, most of the others have already arrived.”

“Has Rowena?”

“Of course not. She has to make an entrance, hasn't she?” Godric grinned at the puzzlement on Salazar's face. “Come on. This is always worth seeing.”

He led Salazar into the castle through the back entrance along the keep, hugging servant's passages and ascending narrow, twisting staircases lacking the opulence that so defined the rest of the manor house. They passed a dozen servants or more, though none of them seemed particularly alarmed to see their lord in the back of the house. Godric smiled and nodded as they went, warm and unthreatening. It was a quality Salazar admired in the man.

The passages twisted and turned. At one point, Godric had to reach up and pop an overhead trap door free, gesturing for Salazar to climb the resulting ladder. When they finally let themselves through a heavy wooden door and broke into open air, Salazar found himself atop the tallest tower in the manor. The sun had just slipped beyond the horizon and the sky was turning a deep and muted blue, the thin warmth of the day evaporating rapidly into stark evening chill. Salazar turned to his friend, eyebrow raised.

“They'll be here any minute,” Godric assured him, eyes on the sky overhead. They waited in silence, Salazar's curiosity warring with his desire to get himself somewhere warm and soothe the aches the day's ride had left him. He was just about to ask what, exactly, they were waiting for, when Godric pointed directly overhead and said, “There.”

To Salazar's relative surprise, he did indeed see something. Three figures had appeared in the sky, silhouetted by the rising moon and descending through a thick patch of clouds. Two of the figures appeared to be male, one young, strong and lean, the other wizened and hunched. Between them was what Salazar could only guess to be the infamous sorceress herself, a regal young woman with the bearing of a queen. All three of them were perched on what appeared to be-

“Brooms?” Salazar hissed; Godric was already chuckling.

“Knew you'd be appreciative. Land ho, milday!” He called as the figures sank towards the tower, offering them a hearty wave. Rowena was the first to touch down, landing delicately on the balls of her feet with barely a sound. The elderly man hit the ground somewhat harder behind her while the younger companion barely managed to right himself after dropping like a stone the last ten feet. An indulgent smile played at the woman's lips as Godric seized her hand and bent to kiss it.

She was beautiful, there was no doubt about that. Rowena of Ravenclaw was famous amongst wizards, the prodigal daughter of the foremost wizarding family in Britain and utterly brilliant besides; Salazar had heard all the stories. He had heard she was lovely, and she was. Tall and willow-thin, she was so pale she seemed to glow in the moonlight. Dark, intelligent eyes gazed out at them from a proud and angular face, softened only by a few soft lengths of dark hair that had escaped the elaborate braid she had restrained it in. An amethyst glittered against her throat but she was otherwise dressed without pretension, preferring dark, sweeping robes and a thin cloak lined with silver embroidery. She wore what Salazar felt was an irritating expression of superiority, but Godric either failed to notice or failed to care. Neither would much surprise Salazar.

“Always a joy to see you, Godric,” spoke the witch in a soft Pictish accent. So the infamous Raven's Glen was somewhere to the north. Salazar had wondered. “You remember my uncle and brother.”

The men behind Rowena nodded, less talkative than she. Godric greeted them both warmly, as he did everyone, before gesturing Salazar to step forward. “My dear, may I introduce you to one of the cleverest and most resourceful wizards it has ever been my pleasure to know?”

One corner of Rowena's blood-red lips quirked upwards. “Salazar of Fen, I assume.”

She did not offer her hand for Salazar to kiss, which was just as well, as he wouldn't have kissed it. The man instead inclined his head in a politely formal bow. “You assume correctly, my lady.”

“I'm glad you're here, then. I wasn't convinced you'd come.” She seemed to be smirking. “I've heard you can be a very difficult man to find.”

“Only for those with cause to find me.” Salazar was eyeing the broom in her hand with an expression somewhere between distaste and mistrust. “You aren't concerned with muggles seeing you?”

“We keep ourselves above the cloud cover.”

“And when you need to land?”

“He's a pleasant one, isn't he?” Rowena said to Godric, more amused than irritated. She seemed to be difficult to ruffle. Godric laughed, again clapping a heavy paw to Salazar's shoulder.

“You'll get to love each other,” Godric assured them. “Two pricklier people never have I met. Shall we?”

He had offered his arm gallantly to Rowena. She took it and allowed him to sweep their way inside, followed closely by her entourage, leaving Salazar to bring up the rear. He was already wondering if he hadn't made a serious mistake.

Godric led them through the Hollow to the great chamber, a spacious room second only to the building's great hall in splendor. Salazar had seen it before, and it remained unchanged; brightly lit by a massive fireplace and several wall torches, it was warm and welcoming, hung with tapestries and outfitted with overstuffed furniture far nicer than anything Salazar normally enjoyed.

Tonight it was also stuffed with twelve or thirteen rowdy witches and wizards tucking enthusiastically into a generous meal provided by House Finchley. Salazar recognized some of them, while others were complete strangers. An aged mystic sat on a very large cushion, picking delicately at a plate of roasted hazelnuts and wearing little more than a diaper. Wendolin herself, a talented metamorphamagi, sat beside two plump, chattery witches, amusing them with her ability to change her hair color at will. None of them seemed the least bit concerned with hiding the fact that they were clearly of magical origin, despite the number of entirely muggle servants rushing about the house. Salazar resisted the urge to pinch the bridge of his nose.

As the last of them entered, Godric drew his wand – inherited from his father, as Salazar understood it - from within his tunic, waved it neatly through the air and the doors shut heavily behind them, bolting into place. Salazar tilted his head in a wordless question, and Godric nodded. The silencing charm had already been laid; they were now free to speak openly.

“Friends!” boomed Godric. “Thank you for coming tonight, and with such haste. I know we are all busy men and women. I trust you're all enjoying yourselves?”

There was a cheer of approval, and several of the party raised their goblets appreciatively to their host. Godric grinned indulgently at his guests.

“My heart sings to hear it. As always, my hearth is your home.”

Salazar helped himself to a mug of hot mead as Godric spoke, slumping into a chair by the fire to watch the proceedings with a critical eye. There was not a single sincerely concerned face in the gathering, not one witch or wizard cognizant of the dangers inherent in such a clandestine conference. It worried him.

“The nosh is pretty decent,” commented the mystic, spitting a hazelnut shell onto the table with a sort of indelicate snort. Salazar grimaced. “But I think we'd all appreciate it if you told us what in the swords and staves we're doing here, young master.”

There was a rumble of agreement among those not focused on stuffing their faces, and Godric nodded.

“Of course. Thrilled by your company though I am, there is business to attend to. Rowena?”

The Lady of the Glen stepped up from behind Godric at that moment, and an unexpected hush fell over the room. If any of them had not met her personally, they could likely surmise who she was; even if not, the witch had a gravity about her, an air of significance that was difficult to ignore. Salazar got the impression that respectful silences frequently followed her entrance to a room. He arched an eyebrow, largely unimpressed.

“Friends,” Rowena said. She didn't raise her voice to the boom Godric had been using. She didn't have to. “I've asked Godric to call you here, away from your homes and communities for the evening, to discuss a matter of growing importance. The threat of exposure by the outside world has always been a concern for our kind, but as of late, incidents of muggle discovery and violence have become more frequent. You've all heard of Wendolin's latest misadventure, I trust.”

Wendolin grinned as all heads turned to her. She was currently wearing the face of an elderly crone, albeit with a mane of bright purple curls. “Gave the folks in Derby quite a show, I expect. You should have seen them. So happy with their little pitchforks.”

Rowena's smile became pursed and less magnanimous. Salazar thought he detected a trace of irritation. “Be that as it may, what time was this?”

“Fourteenth, I believe.”

“You have allowed yourself to be burned at the stake fourteen times.”

“Have you ever tried it?” Wendolin asked, as if this were a very reasonablel question to pose. “It's actually very soothing. It's not like I ever let them catch me with the same face twice, you know. They're convinced they're burning a different witch each time.”

“They're just muggles, m'lady,” chimed in a portly wizard from Heathfield. “It's not as if they can actually do much to the well-armed wizard.”

There was a murmur of agreement, which Rowena silenced with an upraised hand. Anger was beginning to simmer in the pit of Salazar's stomach.

“They may pose little threat in small numbers, but I believe we are potentially approaching an age of great danger for us all,” said Rowena in a cool, clear voice that left little room for argument. “The burnings have become more frequent, and not entirely due to Wendolin's... unusual proclivities. A single burning is manageable, yes, but what of families? What of children discovered before they've mastered their magic?”

Several people glanced around the room, uncertain of how to respond. Rowena shifted her weight, gazing out at them with dark, determined eyes.

“Two young wizards were beheaded four nights ago.” Her words stole the warmth from the room, though the fires continued to burn. “Eight and six years old. Discovered in a raid on a traveling band of witches posing as muggle entertainers. Palm readers. Jugglers. Mercenaries had been following them for weeks. Many of the adults escaped, but the boys did not.”

No one knew what to say.

“Surely they were careless,” whispered one witch finally. “They must have...”

“It makes no difference,” Rowena asserted, and Salazar found he agreed with her. “It is our responsibility as leaders of the wizarding community to keep our people safe.”

“How?” asked Wendolin. At this, Rowena's smile began to resurface, albeit diminished and grim.

“That's what I was hoping we could discuss tonight.”


	3. Chapter 3

Things proceeded slowly. For nearly three hours, the prominent witches and wizards of Britain spoke over each other and petulantly undercut each other, dismissing ideas as soon as they were raised. Rowena's uncle suggested forming a network of fireplaces connected by floo for quick and efficient escape in the event of a raid; a promising concept, but difficult in execution. The wizard from Hatfield spent a great deal of time espousing the merits of moving the wizarding community underground with the dwarves, while Wendolin seemed to be of a mind to simply turn the royal family into chickens. No one was quite sure how this would help, but she seemed pleased with herself regardless.

Salazar remained silent, chewing the inside of his cheek and contemplating the course of the evening. Godric slumped beside him, goblet in hand. They sat in silence for a moment or two, watching a plump witch from a village far to the west animatedly explain how one would begin the process of mass manufacturing invisibility cloaks. Finally, Godric spoke.

“Haven't heard much out of you tonight,” he observed quietly. “I thought you'd have a great many suggestions on this topic.”

Salazar shrugged, looking tired and worn. He sometimes seemed much more than his twenty-seven years. “I wouldn't know where to begin. If I did, I'd have tried by now. Not sure why her ladyship asked me here, truthfully. I don't have much to offer.”

“Do you really think the threat is that significant?”

Salazar looked at his friend with dark and unreadable eyes. He was silent a moment before responding with a nod. “I do,” he murmured. “I do indeed.”

For the first time since Salazar had known him, Godric appeared genuinely worried. It wasn't that Godric wasn't a man capable of seriousness, when necessary – on the contrary, his anger was a fierce and terrible thing, the thunder preceding a lightning strike. Salazar had seen it only once or twice and hoped never to do so again. The man was a brilliant strategist, a gifted duelist and a born warrior, and he understood better than most when to pack up his levity in favor of sword and shield. But Godric had been born to a position of privilege, eldest son of a long line of noble wizards. What had he ever had to fear? The realization that there may be more beyond the walls of his domain than he could hope to control was settling on him now, heavy and ominous, an unfamiliar burden. Concern pulled at his features, constricting his forehead and crinkling his eyes at the corners. It was not an expression Salazar had seen him wear before.

They passed the remainder of the evening in silence, watching the squabbling with nothing to add.

It was very late when they finally adjourned. Rowena had apparently exhausted herself, slumping in a massive claw-footed armchair and looking a little less regal than she had when first descending from the clouds. Despite her fatigue, she seemed satisfied. Salazar wasn't sure why. It didn't seem as if much had been accomplished from where he was sitting.

“I think that's enough for one evening,” she said, her delicate, silvery voice reduced to a delicate, silvery croak. “We'll start the implementation of the floo network as soon as possible. Godric?”

The overlarge wizard to Salazar's right jerked suddenly, as if he had been dozing and was suddenly awoken. It well could have been the case, he supposed. But Godric was on his feet and offering his guests a bow and a smile as if he had been patiently awaiting his cue, brushing off his own weariness in favor of grandiose hospitality. Salazar had no idea how he did it.

“You are all welcome to stay the night, of course,” he announced, though Salazar was fairly sure the sky outside would be starting to lighten soon. “My chamberlain will see to it that you are all comfortably settled and adequately waited upon, but if you please, try not to startle the staff with levitation, transfiguration, or otherwise shattering their world view.”

The room chuckled tiredly. Salazar wasn't sure how, but as soon as the doors opened, the chamberlain in question was standing outside them, bowing politely and waiting to escort his lord's strange guests to their temporary lodgings. Perhaps the man was also a wizard. It had never occurred to Salazar to ask.

In the middle of bidding his good-nights to Godric, Salazar was just about to join the sleepy procession when Rowena rose from her perch, growing serious again. She motioned for the two of them to hang back. Salazar glanced at Godric in surprise, searching his face for any clue of what Rowena wanted, but found only bemusement to match his own.

It was not until the last of the council had tottered out that she swept to the doors, closing them carefully and turning back to face the lord of the keep and his curiously shabby friend.

“I must confess an additional motive to the proceedings tonight,” she said.

Salazar almost groaned aloud.

She gestured for them to sit again, but neither man moved to do so. They had been sitting for far too long.

“Out with it, Rowena,” Godric said wearily, his cheerful visage finally wearing thin.

Rowena huffed quietly, brushing the wrinkles out of her robes as she spoke. “I have been hearing some worrying rumors as of late.”

“About?” asked Salazar. He had crossed his arms and now watched the witch appraisingly, mistrust flickering in his eyes.

“There are tales of a saint living deep in the forests of Gwyr. A lady hermit who walks with the father and does his miracles, healing the crippled, returning sight to the blind. The usual list of saintly offenses.” She had made her way to the dying fire, staring intently at the embers as if they told a story she'd quite like to know. “Muggles speak very highly of her work, it seems. Do you know why I am telling you this?”

They did know, but Salazar was the one to say it, lips quirking sardonically.

“There's no such thing as miracles.”

Rowena nodded, her expression matching his. “Clearly a witch has taken up residence in the area and lacks the good sense to keep herself hidden. I've picked up the trail from no less than four different sources. She'll soon be lunching with the Pope if we don't intervene quickly.”

“The horror,” Godric chuckled, but Salazar continued to eye the witch uncertainly.

“And why are you telling us, specifically?” he asked. “If I'm not mistaken, you have an entire clan of talented witches and wizards to call on for aid in such matters.”

Rowena's narrow shoulders shrugged. It seemed a strangely informal gesture, coming from her. “I do not know the area or what I might find. It would be foolish to go alone. And for all my talents, I'm told I can occasionally come off a bit...” she frowned, either looking for the word or not wanting to say it. “...cold. I am perhaps not the most persuasive individual. Godric has more of a gift for that than I.”

“And me?” Salazar asked.

Rowena watched him a moment, as if sizing him up, comparing him against some inner-concept of what she had expected to find in the lean man from the fens. “I've heard a great deal about you,” she began, gesturing Godric by way of explanation. “Moving among muggles unseen. Posing as a blacksmith, a physician, a monk. I am told that you are a clever and discrete wizard, with a penchant for navigating difficult situations.”

Salazar did not respond. It wasn't untrue, but he wasn't sure how he felt about this woman knowing so much about him. Though he supposed he shouldn't have been surprised. He had heard the Sorceress of Ravenclaw had an uncanny knack for knowing what she could not have known.

“Neither Godric nor I have a great deal of experience navigating the wider muggle world while remaining undiscovered. We've never had to. I would ask that you accompany us on this errand for the safety of all involved.”

“That's it?” Salazar asked, skepticism coloring his voice. “You called me here tonight because you wanted a guide through muggle lands? A number of wizards could have done just as well, many of them present tonight. Why me?”

Rowena's lips pressed themselves into a thin red line. Finally, she gave her head a tiny resolute nod, as if surrendering a pawn to take a rook .

“I have also heard you are skilled in the art of Legilimency,” she said. “That ability is a rarity, as you must know. I feel it may prove useful in the coming days.”

Salazar's jaw had dropped open. Godric looked much the same, as taken aback as Salazar himself. He looked from Salazar to Rowena and back, as if expecting an explanation or confirmation.

“Since when?” Godric asked. Salazar grunted, glaring at Rowena through narrowed eyes.

“A while,” he responded shortly. “How do you know that?”

“It's unimportant. What matters-”

“I do think it's important, actually,” Salazar interrupted. “I taught myself and I've never told a soul. How did you know?”

Rowena smiled grimly, crossing her arms and inadvertently mimicking Salazar's posture. When she finally responded, it was with an air of moderate surrender. “A secret for a secret, then. I suppose it's only fair. I have seen it.”

“Where?” Godric demanded, confounded. “How? I don't-”

The room suddenly grew still as her words sank in.

“Clairvoyance,” Salazar muttered. “A Seer?”

“Unfortunately, yes,” Rowena confirmed. “Very imprecisely so. I cannot control what comes to me, but my visions have never been wrong. I have seen your gift and I have seen that it will be very precious to us in what is to come.”

“What else have you seen?” Godric rumbled quietly, posing the question that lay heavily over all of them. Rowena again shook her head, this time with something of an apologetic look.

“It would do us no good to dwell. Often my visions do not become clear until it's almost too late. But I will tell you what I do know. Something binds the three of us. We are tied to each other, though I'm not sure by what. We will do great things.” She looked at Salazar with some strange softness in her eyes. He found it unnerving. “I've waited a long time to meet you, in honesty.”

Salazar didn't know what to say to that. None of them did. They stood quietly, not quite meeting each other's gaze, listening to the soft pops and hisses of the fire dying in the grate.

“So, what's your plan?” Godric asked in a voice straddling a murmur and a rumble, like the tide rolling against the shore. “We just ride off into the forests of Wales, looking for any old hag with a magic cave and a habit of fixing up muggles?”

“We'll follow the rumor trail as far as it goes and begin our investigation from there.”

“Riding to Gwyr would take weeks,” Salazar objected. “It would be midsummer before we could even begin searching the area.”

“I don't suppose you'd consent to travel by broomstick?” Rowena wondered, but waved it off at the expression Salazar responded with. “I thought not. In that case, given we wouldn't know where to apparate to, I propose we ride from here to Oldden as soon as possible. A goatherd outside the village is a distant relative of mine, and conveniently enough, in possession of a portkey to Deheubarth. That will put us a few days' ride from the last known account of our 'saint's' presence.”

“That is convenient,” Salazar drawled flatly. “How far in advance did you have this arranged?”

“Not long,” was Rowena's brusque reply. “I felt I was wise to prepare for potential stubbornness on your behalf as soon as the situation came to my attention.”

Salazar couldn't bring himself to say anything. He simply glowered.

“I'll need some time,” Godric was telling them. “I can't just disappear without a word. My steward can handle the Hollow in my stead, but we won't be able to get going until midday, at least.”

Rowena dismissed it with a wave of her hand. “If you must. Make your preparations quickly. I'd rather we not end up with another Wendolin on our hands, if possible.”

That, at least, the three of them could agree upon.

They left the great chamber together, Godric not bothering to fully extinguish the fire or any of the torches, let alone worry about the mess his company had left. The servants would see to that. It still boggled Salazar's mind sometimes, knowing someone of such laughably extravagant privilege. They padded their way quietly through the still and darkened hallways, speaking little, until they reached the north wing of the manor. Here was Godric's master chamber, and across from it, the rooms reserved for his most honored guests and closest friends. He was a generous man, Salazar had to admit.

“Rest well while you can,” Rowena advised softly. She then turned without another word and let herself into the grandest guest chamber, shutting the door with an abrupt click behind her. Salazar and Godric stood a moment in the slightly startled silence she seemed to leave in her wake, glancing at each other with raised eyebrows.

“Well,” said Salazar. “She's... different.”

“Isn't she though,” Godric agreed, rubbing his beard thoughtfully. “Your usual room will do alright, then?”

Salazar nodded. It was much more luxury than he was accustomed to in any regard. He had turned with the intention of letting himself into the room and collapsing, but Godric stopped him, one huge hand heavy on Salazar's arm. Salazar turned, confusion written across his face.

Even in the muted darkness, Godric's features were sharp with seriousness. His brow had constricted tightly, and he wore an uncertain look Salazar had never seen before. He hesitated a moment, but finally spoke in a careful whisper.

“She was right, then? You are a Legilimens?”

Salazar stiffened. It was an ability he had kept largely to himself, and for good reason. Uncertainly, he nodded.

“I sincerely hope you will not be offended by what I am about to ask,” Godric said, but the grip on his arm informed Salazar of how deliberate his words were. “But I need to know. Have you ever used Leglimency on me?”

The question was unexpected, and it stung. Salazar's first instinct was indeed towards offense. But Godric was not the sort to be unkind, and was perhaps too trusting; Salazar had always thought it a fault. He was quiet a moment, regarding his friend's familiar features and struggling to put words to his response, warring between deference and indignation, until finally, he shook his head.

“Never,” he breathed, and it was the truth. “I would never, Godric. You know what I came from. It’s kept me alive and I did what I had to, but I would never have invaded your privacy. And you have my word, here and now, that I never will.”

Silence stretched between them, heavy and calculating. It was the silence of the scale, of faith being weighed against suspicion. Somewhere, a nightingale was calling. Salazar's heart beat heavily in his throat.

Finally, Godric's grip on Salazar slackened. His expression relaxed and the warmth returned to his eyes.

“I believe you,” he said, and Salazar silently exhaled. “And I trust you. Thank you for paying me that respect.”

“Always,” Salazar assured him with a gracious nod that was, given the circumstance, almost comical. “My Occlumency is rudimentary at best, but I could always teach you what I know if it would make you feel more secure.” Godric shook his head with a smile that seemed to light the darkened hallway. His goodness went all the way to the bone, Salazar often thought.

“It won't be necessary. Try to get some rest. I'll have a steward wake you before we leave.”

Salazar couldn't argue with that, and so he retired to the room he had, in some way, started to think of as his, closing the door behind him and barely bothering to kick off his boots and peel off his tunic before falling into the familiar bed. He hit with a quiet whumph, wondering how nobility ever got a good night's sleep on something so soft.

There were no windows in the room. This was a measure taken to protect against the chill that lingered in any large stone structure, a common architectural solution made unnecessary in this case by Godric's grandfather's clever use of flagration charms. To hear Godric tell it, the man had possessed quite a knack for setting things on fire, but one could not deny that Finchley Hollow was always curiously, consistently warm. It was one of the best perks to paying his friend a visit. Still, Salazar's room was deeply, flatly dark, true pitch black, no one having bothered to light a fire in the grate. He didn't mind. Salazar stared up unseeing at the stone ceiling above him, mind alight.

He wasn't sure how he felt about being drawn into Rowena's agenda. To be sure, they shared the same goals – or they appeared to, anyway. Every decision he made was based in whether or not it would help wizardkind remain hidden and safe. He had devoted his life to it. And if there truly was some wayward old witch staggering around, healing muggles left and right, it was their duty to intervene, was it not? That was his instinct, at least.

But could they trust Rowena? Salazar wasn't positive. She was brilliant enough, certainly. Every bit the terrifyingly self-possessed young witch the bards were already singing tales of. But she was rash and stubborn, too accustomed to getting what she wanted without argument. She was manipulative and cold. Many of the same criticisms that could be posed against Salazar himself, he realized, but that did nothing to reassure him. Possibly it made things worse.

Salazar had never known a true Seer before. The man was a born skeptic, oddly enough, and normally would have scoffed at the idea, but how else could she have known? He had been so careful. So careful.

He couldn't help wondering what other secrets of his the dark-eyed sorceress already knew. The thought chilled him to the bone.

He rolled over and buried his face in the fine goose down pillow beneath him, allowing his eyes to flutter shut. He was just wondering if he would be able to rest at all when sleep crept up and claimed him, deep and total, as endlessly black as the room in which he lay.

 

Salazar came to the next morning feeling heavy and disoriented, as if he had either drank too much, slept too much or both. Neither could have possibly been the case, but he groaned and rubbed at his eyes regardless. There was an odd quality to the air around him, firelight illuminating the chamber with a strange and unnatural quality that didn't convene with what time of day Salazar's body insisted it must be. This was the problem with manors, he thought. All this luxury throwing off a man's natural rhythms. Couldn't even see where the sun hung in the sky.

As he rolled over and pushed himself up, he realized a figure was standing over him, torch in hand, looking duly unimpressed. Salazar responded with an undignified yelp.

“Good day,” said the chambermaid, a round, businesslike woman in a sensible woolen frock. She seemed absolutely unruffled by a bare-chested Salazar's attempt to scramble back in the bed, bumping into the headrest and stammering what may have either been a flurry of apologies or obscenities. “Lord Finchley has asked me to wake you and ready your room. I did not see anything of... laundrable merit, so I've seen to it that more appropriate substitutes were provided. I hope they will be to your liking.”

“What?” Salazar asked wildly, half-hiding himself under a thick down quilt. The chambermaid rolled her eyes – quite a bold action in the presence of her master's esteemed company, some dim and muddled part of Salazar thought – and gestured to a new wardrobe laid out for him along the opposite edge of the bed.

“If you are in any way unsatisfied, send for me and I will see what else we have available,” the chambermaid was saying as she fixed the torch to its place on the wall and swept towards the door. “Good day.” The barest, most perfunctory of curtsies, as if this woman had been curtsying for nobles all her life and had long since run out of time to indulge them, and she was gone.

Salazar gaped bemusedly around the room. His boots lay where he had kicked them off the night before and his travel bag had somehow made its way up, plopped carelessly on a chair before the fireplace, but his tunic was no where to be found. Inwardly, he swore. Just like Godric, he thought. Pushing his charity on those that had neither need nor want of it.

Hauling himself out of bed and marveling at how warm the stone floor managed to be beneath his feet, Salazar circled around to inspect the damage. To Godric's credit, the offerings were sensible, if not a bit grander than Salazar normally would have been comfortable with. An array of heavy tunics and soft linen shirts were laid out in a multitude of dyes, ranging from deep burgundy to forest green – variety for the sake of variety, he supposed – and were accompanied by several pairs of hose in soft browns and blacks. A velvet surcoat with delicate red and gold embroidery along the hem had been very carefully hung across the desk to his right. He was supposed to help a pair of wizards dripping with equal parts magic and nobility blend into muggle society in these? They'd stick out in any village from here to Dyfed.

Grudgingly, Salazar chose the least offensive of his options, clothing himself in dark, muted greens and charcoals, eschewing the surcoat all together. What was he to do with the thing? He made do with a heavy woolen cape found in the back of the aged wardrobe dominating the corner of his room. If his old, comfortable cloak had been done away with, patches and all, he would just have to find an even shabbier replacement. Not enough could be said for the versatility of a warm and shabby cloak, he felt.

He readied himself quickly, lacing his boots, gathering his meager belongings and striding out of the room with none of his usual stealth. He was of a single mind to track Godric down and give him an earful, more or less unconcerned with the manor denizens that scurried about and cast him sidelong glances as they rushed to complete their morning chores. Unusual guests were a common enough occurrence at the manor that it didn't bear worrying about.

It was much brighter in the wide stone hallway, natural light pouring in from open doors and actual windows. Salazar felt immediately less disoriented. It was early, but not nearly so early as he had initially thought. Midday would be upon them soon enough. He made his way down a twisting side staircase, past the kitchens and out a back door towards the keep, where he suspected he might track down his friend. Chickens and children alike fled from his passage. The clamor of the day had set in with full force, and seemed somehow more tumultuous and harried than usual – the Hollowr's citizens, Salazar realized, were likely readying themselves to hold down the fort in the wake of their master's sudden departure.

He did indeed find Godric in the heart of the keep. The courtyard bustled with the activity of hundreds making rushed preparations. The man stood atop an armament, overseeing a dozen scurrying servants and barking orders to high-ranking soldiers, gruff but not never cruel; people dove to obey more out of respect than of fear. He appeared to be in his element.

Salazar approached, clearing his throat with a terse cough. Godric held up one hand to indicate that Salazar should wait a moment as he checked over a list of some kind that had been thrust into his grip by a nervous-looking porter. He nodded once and then again, more to himself out of anything.

“That will do fine,” he told the porter. “Make sure the eastern fields are well looked after. There've been bandit rumblings again. I don't want any raids while I'm gone.” The porter returned his nod and hurried off, presumably to relay these orders to someone else.

He turned to Salazar with a grin plastered wide across his wild face, all but simmering with excitement. Godric greeted his friend with a clap on the back and a noise like a roar, to Salazar's considerable alarm.

“Great morning for travel!” rumbled Godric. “Look at that sky! There's a fair wind blowing in from the east, and you know what that means.”

“We'll be freezing in the west?” Salazar asked, perhaps a bit more testily than he had intended. Godric either didn't notice or didn't care.

“Lady luck is with us today!”

“I didn't know you concerned yourself with luck.”

“Never have. I make my own,” Godric assured him. “But it never hurts, eh?” He paused, looking Salazar up and down. “Good lord, man. What happened to your clothes? You look almost respectable.”

Salazar ignored the well-intentioned jibe. “I was going to ask you precisely that,” he said, trotting along as Godric suddenly set off to see to a crew of young soldiers testing the blades of their stock weapons and waved for Salazar to follow. “On what authority do you take it upon yourself to dispose of my belongings and-”

“What's that?” Godric asked, distractedly. “No one disposed of your things, Salazar. I certainly wouldn't have allowed-” he paused, holding the flat of a blade in both hands.

Salazar waited patiently for him to say something. Godric was abruptly looking very sheepish.

“It may have been Eleanor,” he admitted, and Salazar's eyes narrowed. “I asked her to see to whatever you needed. It's possible she, ah. Burned the items she found objectionable.”

“Burned them?”

“It's happened before. A particularly tatty cloak of mine. Very strong sense of propriety, that one. She's... a bit strong willed.”

“I've noticed,” Salazar said flatly. Godric couldn't help the snicker that rose up in his chest, handing a sword back to a boy of seventeen and clapping him on the back.

“This is good work, son. Keep it up and you'll be leading armies in no time,” he told the youth, who flushed with pride. “Don't look so sour, Salazar! You have my deepest apologies for the untimely demise of your wardrobe, and I promise it will not happen again. But in the meantime...”

Salazar huffed. In the meantime, he was to walk about reliant on the kindness of extravagant friends, apparently. But Godric was already striding off again, and Salazar hastened to keep up.

“Have you seen Our Lady of Cryptic Prophecy today?” Salazar was asking, and at this, Godric laughed outright.

“Very early this morning. Told her to help herself to whatever's in the kitchens, but I think she might be skulking about the library instead. Speaking of.” Godric pulled out a square of linen wrapped around a block of good cheese, a still-warm roll and a leg of smoked wild turkey. He tossed it to Salazar. “Long day ahead.”

Salazar tore into his breakfast with a growl of thanks, grateful Godric had remembered his preference for simple fare. The food at Finchley Hollow was always fresh, always plentiful and usually unpretentious enough to keep down even when a day of hard riding beckoned. Salazar had never developed a taste for richer offerings.

“What did you tell your subjects about your impending absence?” Salazar asked, dropping his voice an octave as they walked. Godric was apparently bent on inspecting every square inch of the keep before they left.

“I've been called away for the Lord,” Godric responded simply. “Pilgrimage to protect the Holy Lands. I am a tool of His will manifest among men, and I shall do His works no matter the personal sacrifice. Or something.”

“Or something,” Salazar echoed with a wry smile.

“I'm a busy man,” he said with an unconcerned shrug. “They handle themselves fairly well in my absence. It won't present any more of a problem than it ordinarily would.”

Salazar didn't respond. He would never have said so to Godric's face, but he had a hard time believing the fief on the moors would have struggled with or without its leader standing in its keep. Never had Salazar met a noble half so important as they thought themselves to their people. Life continued on in the fields and the forests, with or without the lords that taxed them.

They made their way to the stables, Godric signing off on various preparation plans and ready checks brought to him by rushed-looking servants as they went. Stable hands milled hastily through the stalls with bags of feed and buckets of water, racing to complete their morning chores in the unexpected chaos. Salazar neatly sidestepped a young lad tottering along with a saddle larger than he was. Elsbeth had poked her nose over the stall as they approached and she now whinnied brightly in greeting, receiving a firm pat on the nose in response.

“Think you can have her ready to ride out in an hour?” Godric asked. “We should get moving soon.” Salazar almost snorted.

“We won't need half that,” was his response.

True to form, it wasn't long before the men were making their way into the main courtyard, a wide, wild space of moorland before the castle dotted with tiny, functional storage structures and the occasional shepherd's hut. They had three horses in tow – Elsbeth nosing curiously at Salazar's shoulder, Godric's own chestnut palfrey and a dainty, well-behaved coal-black gelding for Rowena. Someone – a servant, Salazar supposed – had packed for their journey, and the two wizards had taken it upon themselves to strap travel sacks heavy with food and waterskins to their mounts. The supplies would last three people roughly a fortnight, Salazar estimated. Any longer and they'd be on their own.

And so, it appeared, they were ready. It had all happened somewhat faster than Salazar had expected. Normally these preparations took hours, if not days. For his part, he traveled lightly; he was used to making decisions quickly and departing without a word, but the same could not be said of Godric. He wondered if Rowena were any better at it.

Godric's chamberlain had bustled out to see them off and wish his master a fair journey, as had half the manor. But even as Salazar stared out at the crowd that had gathered before him, the third member of their party neglected to appear. Finally, he turned to Godric, eyebrows raised in question.

“She'll be along,” Godric assured him. “Takes her sweet time, that one.”

Sure enough, another five minutes passed before the main doors opened and Rowena came gliding out, pale and perfect even in the harsh light of day. She appeared distinctly unruffled and bore no sign of exhaustion, despite running short on sleep; Salazar wondered how she found the energy to care about maintaining her appearance. She was flanked by her uncle and brother, who, in honesty, Salazar thought had already departed. The strange trio descended on Godric and Salazar, and without a word, her brother began affixing her travel pack to what he correctly assumed to be her horse.

“Good morrow, m'lady!” Godric called with his trademark grin, as dashing as a nobleman could hope to be. “We are honored and fortunate to be graced by your shining visage on the journey that lies ahead.”

“Took you long enough,” Salazar commented before he could stop himself. He then received an elbow to the ribs from Godric for his efforts. “Was the need for a swift departure not the point you yourself raised?”

“Expediency is one thing. Rushing ill-prepared into a situation is another,” Rowena responded primly before turning to hug her uncle tightly, then her brother in turn. “I'll return soon,” she promised them.

Her uncle nodded and whispered something in her ear, to which Rowena smiled. She turned to mount and Godric graciously offered a hand to help her do so, which she accepted. Godric and Salazar followed suit, and at last, Godric turned to his subjects, arm upraised.

“Be well,” he thundered. “Keep me in your prayers, as I keep all of you.” The small crowd around them cheered their goodbyes. It was simple, as parting speeches went.

And then, to Salazar's relief, Godric turned his horse and led them out of the courtyard at a stately trot. Rowena followed behind him, and Salazar brought up the rear, itching to pass out of sight of the gathering and again melt into the anonymity of the road ahead.

“My relations will only be staying until nightfall,” Rowena told Godric as soon as they were well out of earshot. “They'll take their leave as soon as the skies are dark enough.”

“It would make no difference to me,” Godric assured her. “My home is yours, and theirs as well.”

Salazar had to keep himself from scoffing at his friend's generosity. Despite knowing full well how genuine it was, it never ceased to amaze him.

As Finchley Hollow diminished behind them, the easternly wind that had so excited Godric kicked up, ruffling playfully through Salazar's hair. The pressure in Salazar's chest began to lessen and he urged Elsbeth into a canter. He quickly outstripped his companions along the rocky, well-traveled road, and a bark of laughter from behind him was assurance that Godric would not let such a thing go.

Beneath a bright midday sun burning the mists off the moors, two wizards and a witch rode hard for Oldden.


End file.
